The War is in Our Backyard

More evidence the war is right in our back yard. That's the subject of this evening's Talking Points memo.

The feds say former Chicago gang member Jose Padilla, who now calls himself Abdullah al-Muhajir, was an al Qaeda operative who was planning to plant a radioactive bomb if he could get one up and running.

But he was arrested on May 8 in Chicago after getting off a flight from Pakistan. He is being held in a military facility in South Carolina, has been classified as a battlefield combatant.

This, of course, has caused a chorus of human rights people all kinds of angst once again. "The New York Times" and other civil libertarians want all American citizens engaging in attacking their own country in the name of a foreign enemy to have the same rights that a criminal has.

This is so much baloney, you could open a Subway sandwich franchise. War is war, crime is crime. Attacking the World Trade Center and the Pentagon was an act of war, period. Planning to set off a radioactive device after consulting with al Qaeda is an act of war, period.

What is wrong with these civil liberties pinheads?

Title 8 of the U.S. Code on Aliens and Nationalities says this. "An American citizen can lose his citizenship by entering or serving in the armed forces of a foreign state if such armed forces are engaged in hostilities against the United States."

Now, the rights people will quibble that Al Qaeda is not a foreign state, but this kind of hair-splitting is putting all Americans in danger.

So President Bush needs to do a couple of things. First, Title 8 must be amended to include terrorist groups. That's easy, and it should be done immediately. If an American wages war on the U.S. on behalf of a terrorist group, he or she loses citizenship.

And the president should officially declare war against the terrorists and have Congress ratify it. Come on! We're all in jeopardy here. Let's stop fooling around. Our right to live is in danger, and those who threaten civilians should be treated as human rights violators.

Let's take the ammunition away from the small group of Americans who simply don't understand that this is a new kind of war that requires strict defensive techniques.

Jose Padilla is a prisoner of war now. He's also an accused terrorist. Try him in a military court. If he's guilty, say goodbye, Jose, you're gone forever. Trying Padilla in a civil court puts our intelligence apparatus at risk. How and why this man was caught is not important right now, only his guilt or innocence is. And it should be determined by the military, because we're in a war, and radioactive bombs are in play.

Think about that the next time The New York Times demands civil liberties for some captured Al Qaeda guy, American or not.

And that's the memo.

The Most Ridiculous Item of the Day

Time for "The Most Ridiculous Item of the Day."

As you may know, there are some people who run around saying that the Fox News channel is a right wing network, blah, blah, blah. Well, now there is some data. We love data, because it's not ridiculous. According to a survey by the Pew Research Center, viewership for FNC overall is 46 percent conservative, 32 percent moderate, and 18 percent liberal. At CNN, the figure it's 40 percent conservative. So just a little bit above them in the conservative rank. So there.